An interesting mix between hard boiled crime and pulp fiction: a professional hitman who has developed a conscience, of sorts, and targets other professional hitmen. He takes them out and, for an extra fee, offers the intended victim the chance to find out who ordered the contract and take that person out, too.

It's an intriguing premise, and this is told from the first person POV of our conscientious hitman with plenty of sex, violence, gore, and pop culture references thrown in for good measure. The story is a bit on the short side, the twist a bit too simplistic for my tastes, but it was certainly readable. I might try other Quarry novels in the future, if I'm ever in the mood.

As far as amoral homicidal killers go, though, I think I'll stick with Win from the Myron Bolitar series - not much as far as a prickly conscience to deal with =) ( )

In the Wrong Quarry, Quarry no longer works for the Broker, who is no longer among the living. Rather, Quarry has obtained the Broker's lists of contacts and he follows the hired assassins, staking them out and figuring out who their prey is. Once he is confident in that information, he offers a deal to the targets, he will, for a price, take out their hitmen and find whoever is the responsible party. I guess everyone needs a career doing something.

The Wrong Quarry takes Quarry into small-town Missouri, where he has followed an antique dealer and expert at staking out. What is interesting is that Collins takes the reader through Quarry's thought processes as he surreptitiously follows his target to the small-town where Quarry finds that women seem to be throwing themselves at him, including the town tramp and the town beauty queen.
Quarry is almost like a hardboiled detective as he works to figure out what is going on, who is targeted and why. Once he has that figured out, he then has to determine if he has the right quarry or the wrong quarry. The fun in this story is not figuring out the whodunit, but following Quarry through his adventures. Although the story is of recent vintage, it has very much the feel of a much older novel, particularly the setting of the early 80's in the rural Midwest which Collins conveys through what plays on the radio.

As with all of the Quarry series, this one is recommended reading. Enjoy. ( )

I read this book for my mystery book club. We were supposed to read a book from Hard Case publishing - a company going back and reviving old hard case books. I didn't like reading this in public because the cover art is atrocious with a scantily dressed young woman tied up and looking frightened and a touch looking man with a gun. Quarry (not his real name) was an for hire killer working for a middle man who handled the money and the details and gave out jobs to people like Quarry. Apparently, before the book opens, he found the middle man was about to betray him so he killed the middle man and took all his files. He then starts trailing hit men to who they are going to hit, figures out who the victim is going to be and contacting that person. He informs the victim someone is going to kill him/her and gets payment to stop the killer. He then kills the killer and tries to find out and get rid of whoever sent the killer. In this case, he trails one of a pair of killers. The man he is trailing is the one who watches the victim, gets his schedule and habits and then passes the information on to the second of the pair who will do the killing. The victim is a man with a dance company teaching pretty young girls dance and helping some get ready for beauty contests. The daughter of the richest family in town disappeared. She was a student. He tells Quarry that he has been blamed for her disappearance. Quarry meets and beds a member of the family who has slept with a lot of men. He believes it was the grandfather who hired the hit. He kills the killers and meets up with the grandfather and discovers the truth about the dance instructor who then trick him and take him picture. He manages to turn the tables and kills him and his partner, a woman posing as a high school student, both of whom have been killing girls across the country. Not a bad book but I hated the cover.

Quarry is a hitman who kills hitmen. When a hit is ordered he follows the hitmen and discovers who their victim is and offers to kill them instead. He will then, for a price, discover who hired the hit. Quarry follows the stake-out guy to a small Missouri town and finds the victim is a dancer studio owner. Offering his services to the owner, he sets out to kill the hitmen and find out who wants the hit. Along the way he discovers that maybe, just maybe, this time he might be on the wrong side. This is my first Quarry book. I liked him, his work ethic, and his luck with the ladies. He does genuinely want to do what is right, not just kill for killings sake. The story is believable and well thought out. It's full of action and adventure with some sex thrown it. I will be finding more Quarry books to read. He's my kind of guy. ( )

I have read all the Keller, Quarry and Parker books except for this, the most recent. It’s good.

What is it about “hit man” books that attracts us (or me anyway?) I suspect it’s the lifestyle, the hunt, the tracking, etc. The Walter Mitty quality of it all. I think it would be great fun -- except for the killing part. There I draw the line. Guess I’d be a lousy hit man. Come to think of it, I’ve never had women fawning all over me either. That’s OK, my wife loves me.

Collins has taking Quarry in a novel direction. Rather than being hired through a middle man to hit people, he’s managed to obtain the list of contacts kept by the broker and is using it to determine who the target might be. He then contacts the target and offers to eliminate the threat from the hit man -- for a fee, of course.

Cute. You can read a basic plot summary above, so I don’t feel it necessary to reiterate it. Let’s just say that after the preliminaries, Quarry thinks something's just not right.

Fun. ( )